Blog by Baltimore Sun sports columnist David Steele

Temper, temper II

Now, for Part II of our anger-management class, we bring you Mike "I'm a man! I'm 40!'' Gundy, the Oklahoma State football coach.

Where do we even start? How about at the very beginning, when he refers to a Saturday column in the Daily Oklahoman as an "article'' about 10 times? How about the way he constantly berates the writer for not having children (which, among other reasons this is so below-the-belt, we don't know if it's true or not)? How about where he claims that "three-quarters'' of the "article'' is inaccurate, but never says which parts? How about the applause at the end from the Oklahoma State toadies who were allowed access to a postgame press conference?

How about the entire implication that he, the head coach, should have the final say on how the media should write about his players, and that "amateur'' athletes (at a BCS program at a state institution openly and publicly bankrolled by T. Boone Pickens, one of the richest men on the planet) are exempt from media criticism? How about how he never explains why the player in question got benched in the first place, or in fact says a single word about the game his team had just played? How about how, in his attempt to show what principles he has, he calls the sports editor of the Oklahoman, who he may or may not have ever met, "garbage''?

How about the yahoos on all the OSU message boards applauding what he did, and the athletic director not having a problem with the head coach of his biggest-revenue sport looking and sounding like a 12-year-old who didn't get the PlayStation he wanted for Christmas? How about the writer herself asking Gundy yesterday what exactly was "inaccurate'' about her "article'' and him replying that he didn't have to say?

How about the suspicion here that the entire supposedly spontaneous, out-of-control tirade smelled incredibly calculated and pre-fabricated?

Gundy didn't invent the ploy and won't be the last to use it. What's better to talk about -- his career 13-15 record? The loss to Troy (41-23!) the week before, the game that seems to have cost the player in question his starting job? That day's 49-45 win over Texas Tech, whose defense is so wretched that its defensive coordinator quit the next day? Or an "article'' in that morning's paper, which he conveniently had with him when he spoke to reporters after the game? And remember, berating the writer in private wouldn't have the same effect on players, athletic officials, boosters and fans, who otherwise would have been preoccupied with actual game results.

It's called changing the subject. It worked. Now, no one's debating whether he's a lousy coach, they're debating whether he's crazy, whether the columnist is a fraud (and whether she has children), and whether this makes the Meltdown Hall of Fame. I say no, because real meltdowns -- Dennis Green's, for one, or Hal McRae's, or the grand-daddy of 'em all, Lee Elia's (extreme language alert) -- have to be authentic. Pure, in a sense. This was as phony as phony can get.

In Gundy's defense, if the scene the writer described in her column isn't true, he has a right to be mad. If it is true, then it's unbelievably embarrassing to everybody involved. We're talking about the scene where the player is being fed chicken by his mother outside the team charter after a game. Eeeeewwwww.

Bottom line: Mike Gundy is a jackass. Don't worry, though, he can take the criticism. He's a man, he's 40.

Coach Gundy's selection to lead the osu team was political choice not one based on merit or record. Unfortunately for coach, The Daily Oklahoman has as much ink as T.Boone does dollars. i enjoyed the columist's article.

Nothing worse then media members defending other media members. He had ever right to attack that sports writer. It amazes that media members feel its fine to attack a COLLEGE player. Do you ever wonder why people hate the media so much. Its junk like this.

The coach may have been out of line.The reporter may also be out of line. There is no question however, that the above article, is absolutely saturated with the same 12 year old antics which you have accused the coach of using. Had it been a well thought out, intelligent response to the coach's "meltdown", instead of a painfully obvious and emotional defense of a fellow reporter, this article might had had some signifigance. Unfortunately it's an embarrassment to whom ever scribbled it down.

Dave, did you even read the article? If you did you would have seen that Ms. Carlson crossed the line, this was a personal attack. She talked about his nerves and supposed lack of toughness as if she has played football. The only thing she's tackled lately is a buffet.

Sir, you are completely wrong and just frankly stupid for writing this. If the accusations that the coach as charged the writer with are in fact true then he had every right to be very upset with the article. and you for even considering taking the side of a writer who openly criticizes and demeans a 19 year old boy for doing some things wrong should be fired and given a new job as a janitor at a insane asylum.

You started off with the right remark.
Column vs Article. It would have helped your argument if Ms Carlson would have known the difference herself. A column is an opinion. An article,feature,story whatever you want to call it, is one that is comprised of facts. She defends it was a column, but then claims she stands by her facts! Can't have it both ways.

Her facts are wrong. Just like several other stories she has written where her facts were just flat wrong. You should have made yourself aware of this before you defended her.

Secondly, you are obviously writing about something you didn't even watch. Had you watched the press conference you would know that he pointed out several of the items that were in "whatever you want to call it" that were false. Why should he have to do it again?

Third, you should never under any circumstances defend an article written about an african american athlete that is riddled with fried chicken references. CLASSY ! !

It’s so easy for a writer to sit at his or her computer and type the words that malign an amateur athlete knowing that the journalism community will defend whatever is written as “news”. We never get objective coverage from the media when the media is at issue. The fact that Steele doesn’t even mention the name of the writer (Jenni Carlson) in his article shows that he’s not looking for accountability, but only to somewhat blindly defend a fellow writer. With this article I’ve lost a lot of respect for David Steele. I’ve also gained a lot of respect for Gundy; a guy willing to defend his players no matter how foolish ESPN may try to make him look. Fortunately, since most columnists eventually out themselves as ego driven lemmings, as soon as the untruths in Carlson’s column are exposed other columnists will immediately turn on her. Readers have come to expect this behavior from even credible media outlets (as well as the Baltimore Sun).

As a bit of background, I have no connection to OSU, OU, or Oklahoma. I'm a 47 year old college football fan who went to UCLA and roots for USC and the Pac-10 above all else. I have no bias for or against Oklahoma State Football.

I have now read Ms. Carlson's article four times. I'm saddened that a man with your experience cannot see how wrong it was for her to write such an article - and why a coach could be so angry at her for her writing it.

Tell me what a sentence such as " His mother was feeding him chicken." has to do with a story about football, other than to attempt to belittle Reid as a "momma's boy"?

How can you excuse an article which begins a sentence with "Word is..." What does that mean? "Word is?" Who's word? Who is saying what? It's a cheap trick to create the impression that there is more than just rumor and innuendo - which there isn't.

How about the use of "apparently" in the sentence, "Reid, then a redshirt freshman, was facing competition from returner Donovan Woods, and apparently, Reid considered leaving OSU just because he had to compete for the spot." What does "apparently" mean? It's a pretty simple straightforward fact. Either Reid considered leaving OSU or he didn't. Which is it? Why use "apparently?"

How can you excuse a sentence such as "Other times, though, Reid has been nicked in games and sat it out instead of gutting it out." Ms. Carlson is SPECULATING that Reid was only nicked. How does she know? I played college football, and sometimes injuries are more severe than they appear. You can walk, talk, and act normally, yet not be able to perform. How can you excuse such speculation. There is nothing factual in that sentence. It's yet another cheap attack on Reid's character.

Ms. Carlson wrote: "The bottom line: The switch is less about Robinson's play and more about Reid's attitude." This is directly contradicted by the coaching staff. What did Ms. Carlson base her OPINION on, and why did she present her opinion as fact?"

"Or does he want to be coddled, babied, perhaps even fed chicken?" Another cheap shot. Jesus. How can you, honestly, defend such writing?

I'm stopping now because rereading the article again is just making me angrier. You, for defending such an article, and Mike Sherman, the editor of the Oklahoman, for standing behind it, should be ashamed. Occasionally, the writer is wrong. There is no need for other writers to ALWAYS defend the writer - regardless of the reality.

I find it fascinating that the only ones truly defending Jenni Carlson are other sportswriters. If you visit any of the websites that have comments in Oklahoma, the posts are running about 30-1 against Carlson and for Gundy.

If I was connected in anyway to OSU, I'd be telling anyone I know to avoid The Oklahoman newspaper like the plague. Furthermore, I'd be removing all advertising from the paper. I hope people do so. Because as long as writing like this is allowed to be published, our public discourse will continue to deteriorate. We expect newspapers to stick to facts in the reporting sections of their papers. If Ms. Carlson wants to do opinion journalism, she should move to the editorial page.

You're too experience a pro to rationalize and excuse writing such as Ms. Carlson's.

I get so tired of the media and there stupid questions and false reporting, Gundy is not a very good coach we all know at this point but at least he has the guts to come out and protect his players, the woman who wrote the article even said she made some mistakes, go figure, just trying as they said to get more job offers as she probably has now. You never know what to believe anymore with news, sports or anything when it comes to journalism. We need honesty and integrity in everything in life!!!!

heck hath no fury like a media figure scorned, and we can always rely his/her fellow media-ites to watch his/her back. I did a google search and read five or six similar outraged (Outraged!) diatribes before finding the original column, in which, among other comments, she suggests the player in questions wants to be 'coddled, babied, perhaps even fed chicken' (a reference to his mother bringing him some food after a game.) she also points a finger at him for sharing a laugh at the end of a tough loss with the conditioning coach. (How dare he laugh during a game!) she doesn't berate the coach in question, who may well have been trying to cheer up the players.
The qb, Reid, is a 21 year old amateur, and did not deserve the snarky criticism this woman (not that her gender matters) wrote. Gundy was defending a player.
Three cheers for Coach Gundy. and nuts to you media-ites. God forbid one of you be held to some sort of accountability!!!

David Steele I may or may not know you are a world class jerk, but I suspect you are. Imagine for a moment, a columnist defending another columnist who strayed to far from the buffet table to attack a young man by inferring he was a yellow coward. Then imagine suggesting, as you did, that a hate missile published in a public forum, was best discussed in private. For God's sake, where is your common sense?

It really is a shame that even as a seventeen year old, I am able to make more mature and intelligent comments than this article portrays. I agree with absolutely every comment below me that degrades you and the guaranteed degrading comments to follow. You sir are nothing more than a pompous ass with little better to do than support the defacing of a kid. People like you can be found at dog fights and drug deals... too rapped up in finding the bad in good people, to realize the bad all around you. Please waste your time elsewhere.

David, as they say "It takes one to know one". I think we all know who the jackass here is. YOU! This is a coach taking up for his player that was deliberately attacked by this "sports writer"??? Give us a break here. Your article is worse than hers!

It's almost humorous how you are defending an article written in such poor taste.
Perhaps Gundy's "tirade"
was over the top...but your defense
of the article is also over the top.
Ms. Carlson had to know this would
create quite a stir ...so she has accomplised her personal mission (at
Bobby Reid's expense). She owes
him an apology.

How about all those alumni siding with the coach? How about all the students as well? How about the fans who read the column or saw the response on television? How about just about everyone who heard of this story and its aftermath? The only people who think the coach was wrong are in the media-the out-of-touch, tunnel dwelling, single-minded media.

Wow. So most of you think it is perfectly appropriate behavior for millionaires to go off on over-the-top public tirades about how working stiffs do their jobs - even when it seems pretty clear that the job done was within the bounds of the job description.

No, I'm not buying that. What's really going on here, besides woman-hating, is that big-time college sports is such a sick idea in itself that it generates awkward situations like this. Big-time sports should be professional, and college sports should not be big-time. But we're so far beyond the actual reasons for colleges to have sports teams that we're way, way, into a bizzaro land where really terrible behavior like Gundy's can seem defensible.

I used to think you wrote some good columns, but you and others on the Sun staff are going down the path of hack journalism ala Mike Preston. Are Sun sales drying up or what? You brought up the fact about an OSU loss the week before. Consider they just got done upsetting a decent opponent, and the coach took the time to defend a player he benched for the game. Planned? Probably. Only yellow journalists are calling it a meltdown, just like you referred to the coach's defenders as "yahoos". Consider that he does have a losing record in his tenure, you might think the "yahoos" would make use of this incident to get rid of him in football mad country. They didn't, they backed the coach. I'd rather have a child play for a coach who defends them from attacks when the only thing the kid did wrong was play a little poorly, and some hack wants to tear the kid down about his poor attitude. If he had a poor attitude, as she wrote, would you not think the coach would have said that when he benched him? Dismissed him from the team maybe? No, the coach defended him from an obvious unwarranted attack and columnist conclusions drawn based on "observations" of him laughing on the sideline during a loss and other petty observations or a few comments he made to someone else and took out of context. THOSE types of inaccurate attacks she leveled are what the coach was referring to, she had no basis to write the drivel she did. Just as you have no basis, you are just ranting, masquerading as an intellectual (of what is uncertain at this point). I think more coaches should avoid the media, particularly print. You like to start controversy where there is none to sell papers.

David,
I was recently at a Special Olympics track and field event and it appeared that some of the athletes were giving less than 110%. Should I expect a scathing column in the Sun about their lack of mental toughness and weak spirit?

There are two truisms in the world of sports: 1) When an athlete says "it't not about the money," it's always about the money; 2) When a coach says "I never read the papers," he reads the papers. Hopefully he'll enjoy the rest of his 15 minutes of fame this week and cashing the fat checks OSU will continue to pay him for his coaching percipience. Because two years from now, when he's a Wal-Mart greeter, he probably won't be able to get away with screaming tantrums at customers who turn down the yellow happy-face stickers he'll be passing out.

Check the opinions of people in Oklahoma, OSU and OU fans alike, who know the coach and writer more intimately and have seen both in action and you'll see that the public opinion is running about 90% in favor of Gundy and against Carlson. Would that deserve any consideration in your thoughts on this matter?